


MY CORONA

by spicyshimmy



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Awkwardness, Flirting, M/M, Oblivious, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-20
Updated: 2012-09-20
Packaged: 2017-11-14 17:00:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spicyshimmy/pseuds/spicyshimmy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bad puns. Missed opportunities. Choose your own Blastoventure. Crowthis on tumblr wanted to see first-game Kaidan with a monster crush and a totally oblivious Shepard, and this awkwardness came out of it. <i>It’d been fourteen years since the last time, but the symptoms were the same. Tight chest. Racing heart. Unsteady hands and a blind-spot about a mile wide.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	MY CORONA

It’d been fourteen years since the last time, but the symptoms were the same. Tight chest. Racing heart. Unsteady hands and a blind-spot about a mile wide.

Fourteen years was a long time, a lot of years. But it wasn’t enough to develop an immunity; this was one of those diseases you could carry forever without a relapse, until you hit the right combination of external stressors and there it was.

Hot. Sticky. Uncomfortable. Feverish and messy—and there was no prescription strong enough to take care of the problem.

You just had to ride it out.

Kaidan just had to ride it out.

He had the training and the experience outside of training necessary to do exactly that. This wasn’t a simulation room exercise anymore. These were real variables with real consequences, more than just a few sore ribs and a form filed for extra medigel to heal them up, shifting and aching in the night, something deeper twinging between the muscle and bone whenever he rolled over, looking for comfort that never showed up.

Eventually, you just learned to sleep in one position and that was about the end of _that_. Nothing too uncomfortable. Stiff backs in the morning were for old soldiers, not young ones.

‘I should go,’ Shepard said.

Kaidan blinked. In that amount of time, colonies were destroyed, valuable assets lost, Omega underground hierarchy completely overturned, batarian warships carrying human slaves slipping under the radar and shipping out to Khar’shan. Kaidan knew the stats on how many new biotics there’d be every minute and the stats on how many would be lost in that same minute. It was all a part of the scientific principle that matter was neither created nor destroyed. Checks and balances—the galaxy hadn’t blown up yet, not all of it, so it must’ve really worked.

…How long had he been zoning out?

‘Yeah,’ Kaidan said, shaking off the fog. ‘…See you around, commander.’

Too formal; too informal at the same time. The balance in this part of the galaxy was off, so small that nobody else would notice, but Kaidan was living it every day and he noticed it all the time. A deeper twinging between the muscle and bone. Watching Shepard head off to chat with Garrus instead, wearing his civvies, the back of his head shaved and square and hit with a curve of light before he turned a corner and took that miniature corona in tow.

_Corona_. Kaidan had been reading one too many bad extranet serials lately, pay-per-download, one of those bad habits that didn’t seem expensive on its own until the cost really started adding up.

Shepard was a guy, not a sun. Sometimes he reminded Kaidan of a supernova, but that was the bad extranet serial talking, not him.

He washed it out of his hair; it stayed on his skin.

He burned it out of his throat with awful—basically undrinkable—ship coffee; it stayed on his tongue.

He slept in one position and woke up in another and if there was a pang hitting him square between the ribs like friendly fire at having to get ready so early, at least he didn’t feel it. He got up, got his boots on, and got a start on the day. A solid routine made for a solid constitution.

After a mission, Shepard took off his armor, sweat staining the back of his neck, grooving into the scar on his upper lip. He wiped it with the back of his hand, shucked off his gloves, unlocked the ceramic chestplate with a hiss of the joints and a hiss through his teeth. He made the rounds, talking to Garrus and Ash and Liara and finally Kaidan, Kaidan last, conversations they’d had twenty times before if they’d had them once.

Fourteen years, and Kaidan was watching somebody’s mouth when they talked again, Shepard’s blue eyes over sharp cheekbones over deep shadows. He almost had dimples until he grinned the wrong way and they became wrinkles instead, scars, hard lines in a hard face.

‘I ever tell you how grateful I am there’s somebody on this ship who isn’t obsessed with calibrations?’ Shepard asked.

His voice was stiff—just like his back was stiff, after a duck-and-roll maneuver while fighting Geth in the tunnels on Feros. Kaidan didn’t even flex his fingers, joints aching. He stood to attention like a soldier with his CO—and also like a friend talking to a friend, figuring his hands were full enough balancing those two things already.

Navigating all this must’ve been what the untrained mess cooks felt like trying to work the Normandy’s only coffee machine. Kaidan was still working on a personal theory that they’d given up a few days into service and they were just tapping directly into the fuel canisters now.

It was the only thing that could explain the aftertaste, the heartburn—and the consistency.

‘I won’t ever calibrate on you, Shepard,’ Kaidan said. ‘I promise.’

There was no question about whether or not that sounded stupider in his head than it did out loud. Six of one and half a dozen of the other. Kaidan chuckled, or coughed, or…something; whatever it was, Shepard did it too.

‘Good job out there today, soldier,’ Shepard said.

Kaidan counted down.

Three, two, one—

‘I should go,’ he added.

‘Talk to you later, Commander,’ Kaidan replied.

Saluting was better than a handshake. Handshakes made for physical contact and physical contact gave Kaidan heartburn, too.

No corona this time, at least. Kaidan must’ve been getting better—or so used to the glow that it’d blinded him permanently. Another personal theory of his he didn’t share, not because this one was funny so much as it was stupid. He downloaded another pay-per-story, not even wanting to know what his bill was gonna be at the end of the month.

*

‘Oh, hey—is that the new Choose Your Own Blastoventure?’ Shepard asked.

Mess Hall. Oh one-hundred. Kaidan was getting a jump start on the day, or…the day’s humiliations, anyway. And Shepard’s voice was like a jumper cable to the chest.

Rahna’d made him feel that way, too. All elbows. All late growth spurts. All aching muscles in the night, a dull pounding at the base of his skull. It was an old scar and old scars weren’t supposed to hurt.

‘It’s, uh…the new Fleet and Flotilla, actually,’ Kaidan said, looking up over his midnight snack. With enough exercise, L2 biotics passed out unless they refueled. If the fuel part had been more literal, he would’ve gone straight for the coffee. He had to wonder why he was the sort of guy who kept all his best material to himself. ‘They do this serial… Updates every Monday, oh eight hundred Citadel Standard Time. I’ve been following them for a while now, actually, and it’s definitely one of the more… You’re just here for a midnight snack, not a book club, right?’

Shepard unwrapped his protein bar and bit in. ‘Keeps you on your feet,’ Shepard replied. ‘Keep up the good work, Kaidan. Try to get some shut-eye, while you’re at it.’

Three, two, one…

‘I should go,’ Shepard said.

‘Yeah, me… Me too,’ Kaidan agreed, datapad light flashing against his face, Shepard’s eyes lighting up but only from the reflected glow.

*

It was thirteen hundred—Citadel Standard Time—when the Normandy powered down in the Citadel docking bay. Kaidan had finished _Fleet and Flotilla: New Moons_ about an hour before that, just before prepping for the Mass Relay to take them into the Sol system.

_Hey Shepard_ , he thought. _Maybe we could go grab some coffee that doesn’t taste like there’s elcor remains in it for a change, what do you say?_

_Looking for some company to get those pesky assignments done before the next mission?_

_You down for some calibrating, just the two of us?_

_I don’t know why I just thought that._

_I don’t know why I’m still thinking that._

‘Hey, Shepard,’ Kaidan said. ‘…You wanna borrow my datapad? I’ve got some of the Choose Your Own Blastoventures on there, after all.’

‘I might just take you up on that offer when I get back on the ship,’ Shepard said. A salute was better than a handshake.

_Do you…_

_Mention Calibrations? (Click here)_

_Ask about that coffee? (Click here)_

_Lose your cool and say whatever? (Click here)_

Kaidan tabbed into the appropriate choice, already knowing what the page’d say. _The end_. _Would you like to try again? Click here to start over._

He rubbed his temple and shook his head. Commissioned lieutenant might be more about the benefits than the flat salary, but he had enough on him to get himself that coffee, and it only burned his tongue instead of his throat.

*

‘I’m here to take you up on that offer, Kaidan,’ Shepard said.

Kaidan had run through this simulation drill too many times to count. Cool as Blasto himself, Kaidan always turned around and said, mouth twisting crookedly, not a single dark hair out of place: _Can it wait, Shepard? I’m in the middle of some calibrations._

It was a good line, so of course, Kaidan didn’t use it. He looked up instead to find Shepard leaning in the doorway, his arms folded over his chest. It was the closest to ‘at ease’ as Kaidan had ever seen him, so that had to mean something.

Then again, everything did. And once that happened, you were left with nothing at all.

‘Oh, yeah—the Blastoventures,’ Kaidan said.

‘If I came here for the calibrations, then I’d’ve come to the wrong place,’ Shepard replied.

They chuckled, or coughed, or whatever it was they did together—some kind of sound that made Kaidan feel nineteen again, headaches only as bad as the other aches: the ones between his ribs or inside the bone, humming through his veins while he brushed sweat off his forehead with the rolled up sleeve at his elbow, hunkered down beneath a comm.-desk and waiting for his omni-tool to hack the system. The biotics who made it out of brain camp were well-rounded; nobody could say they weren’t. They were also ten kinds of messed up, systems hacked but not exactly recalibrated, and it took years— _years_ —for the nightmares to stop. To wake up without the sudden jolt of a system going from sleep mode into overdrive. Like there was no such thing as the in-between.

‘I’ve got the, uh, Thessiadventures and Omegaventures collection on here, I think.’ Kaidan cleared his throat again. Or chuckled. Or groaned. ‘Not exactly the newest, but… Yeah, they’re classics, right?’

‘Weird thing is, I always wind up with a _The End_ somehow,’ Shepard replied, callused fingers brushing Kaidan’s knuckles as he took the datapad. ‘Now, I know you can go back to the start after, but something about it’s just not the same.’

‘Yeah,’ Kaidan agreed. ‘Tell me about it.’

He thought about Shepard that night—a little bit about the glow of the datapad app on his face, the color of his eyes in the concentrated rectangle of light, the nick of the scar on his upper lip, but mostly about the rough spots on his rough hands, where the nails were broken, where incendiary round burns darkened his swollen knuckles and freckles spread like stars across the skin.

Kaidan’s hands were rough, too, and naturally warmer. A biotic’s body temperature was consistently high. His palms got enough friction and heat that he practically _was_ nineteen again—nineteen or younger, the first time he discovered those extranet sites Mom had given him the Talk about—with his forehead pressed against the cool tiles of the shower wall, the spray washing him clean, washing it all down the drain, to get ejected in a biodegradable economically sustainable compact form. Flotsam, drifting through space.

Kaidan grabbed a few proteins to refuel after. _Keeps you on your feet_ , he thought, like one of the pop-up ads that flashed between chapters of the great Blastoventures. _Delicious and nutritious too. Part of this complete breakfast. Two for me, none for you._

The double-packs were great.

Kaidan ate like a teenager and slept like one, too.

*

Shepard was oblivious. Kaidan had known for a long time he didn’t really have a type, but if he did, this’d be the one.

People who didn’t notice the way he looked at them. Or people who were decent enough to maintain his dignity by not bringing it up.

They worked well together. They had this rhythm… When Shepard went down for cover and to reload, Kaidan spotted him; when Kaidan needed to catch his breath, Shepard was right there at his back.

Kaidan was old enough now to know that meant Shepard was a good CO.

_Do you…_

_Play it cool and avoid fraternization?_

That was the only option.

The click of Shepard’s Kessler was kind of like the click to the next page. There was sweat on Kaidan’s temples underneath his helmet and friendly fire mixing with heavy fire, Geth swarming the area. So there really wasn’t time or room or any reason to think about something that happened somewhere else, to somebody else, the guy Kaidan was when he took off his armor and sat on the edge of his bed.

He’d recharged long enough and Shepard needed to do the same. Their rhythm was on point even when Kaidan’s heart felt like a singularity, threatening to tear the entire system of his body apart from the inside out.

He settled for tearing the nearest Geth Trooper apart from the outside-in. The rest was muscle memory, all the aches settling into a distant burn, and he had to admit, the coffee they’d had in the mess hall that morning was fueling him now the way real coffee wouldn’t have done, so maybe there was something to the recipe after all.

Eventually—through the ringing in his head, the aftershocks pulsing through his armor, the way his teeth hummed in his clenched jaw, heating up too quick for cooldowns to make much of a difference either way—there was gonna be silence. It always came. When the last hostile fell, or the alternative, which Kaidan didn’t so much think about as an option.

He knew what waited for him at the end of it, shoveling down stir-fried proteins in the mess hall with Ash and Shepard afterward. Kaidan was the only one who used his knife—he couldn’t say whether or not he was the hungriest.

‘Tastes good when you’re hungry,’ Shepard said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

‘Doesn’t have to taste good,’ Ashley replied, doing the same.

Kaidan wasn’t sure who he agreed with more. The truth was probably another compromise, settled somewhere between both.

‘Delicious and nutritious, too,’ Kaidan said.

‘Thanks for the loan, Kaidan,’ Shepard told him later, showing up to return the datapad. ‘If you think you can get those on file transfer for me, that’d be great.’

‘Is that an order from my CO?’ Kaidan asked.

Shepard chuckled. Or…coughed. Or cleared his throat, or tried to poke a sticky protein chunk from behind his molar, shooting it down the wrong way. ‘A favor from a friend is more like it.’

‘Sure. You got a spare data driver on you?’ Kaidan waited while Shepard patted down the pockets of his jackets and jeans, then held up his hands in a shrug. ‘…Right. That’d be… Hey, I think I’ve got one hanging around here somewhere.’

He did, in a lower storage compartment he had to bend down all the way to search through. Then he plugged in and started the transfer. ‘You’re gonna need the password to my Enkindle account to access the files, though. I think you can download it on two devices before getting the surcharge… Username’s kalenko2151. Password’s…’

There was the problem with the plan. Kaidan looked up and Shepard’s face had settled into what Kaidan was starting to think of as his screensaver mode. Blank eyes, head somewhere else, what every recruit learned eventually—or they didn’t, but that never worked out for them. Keep the chin up, keep the shoulders straight, and keep on keeping on. This was a routine check-in.

Shepard was a good CO.

‘…Password’s pudding,’ Kaidan finished finally. ‘It’s…kind of a long story.’

It was a short story, actually, and there was no choosing your own adventure interactive element. It was just a kid and his nickname and the principle that the simpler a password was, the less anybody’d guess it to crack.

‘That story’s not on the data file you’re transferring, is it?’ Shepard asked. ‘Sounds like one I’d like to read sometime.’

‘No explosions,’ Kaidan said.

‘Damn.’ Shepard shook his head. Neither of them coughed or choked or chuckled. ‘How’d you know that was just what I was thinking about?’

‘Good guess, maybe,’ Kaidan said. ‘…Or we’ve been serving together long enough that I’m starting to know what your tastes are.’

‘Keeps you on your feet,’ Shepard agreed. ‘And on your toes. Two varren with one shot.’

‘A good commander has to multitask, is that it?’ Like carrying on a conversation while transferring a small but embarrassing collection of, uh, literature as a favor. For a friend. ‘Almost done. …You have to go through the whole thing as many times as it takes to get all the endings too?’

‘When I’ve got the time for it.’ Shepard paused. ‘A good commander _makes_ time. Thanks for the Blastoventures, Kaidan.’

His smile was a grin and it was shaped just right to make the lines come back, more than dimples, deeper than scars, a lived-in face waking out of sleep mode and lighting up brighter than sunrise on the Citadel. _Corona_ , Kaidan remembered, and chuckled when he was alone, or coughed, or choked, rubbing his temples until his hair finally fell out of place.

*

Shepard asked him what he thought the best ending was three days later. He was still armored up, taking it off piece by piece, hiss by hiss, shaking his hand out when he touched a plate that was still carrying too much heat and his glove sizzled.

‘I was all for _Destroy the facility_ ,’ he added, ‘but after that, things seemed kind of…vague. Do you rejoin your crew after, or are you trapped forever on the space station? That’s what I can’t figure out.’

‘There was this big debate about that one on the forums, actually,’ Kaidan replied. ‘And, you know, I _think_ they released some kind of patch with longer endings to clear it up.’

‘Hey—that Blasto’s a pretty popular guy,’ Shepard said. ‘You happen to know where I can download those patch releases?’

‘I could come by captain’s cabin later.’ This was on the books. Strictly _and_ literally. It wasn’t fraternization, just your average conversation between a soldier and his commanding officer about mass-produced semi-literate entertainment options. Space was a big, lonely, empty place sometimes. If anybody’d earned the right to relax now and then, to know how a story was finished, it was Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy SR-1, standing about two feet in front of Kaidan, eyes bigger and bluer than they’d ever been. ‘Hook your datapad up to the mainframe, see if I can download the free content for you after dinner.’

When Shepard said yeah, sure, _that’d be great, Kaidan,_ it wasn’t exactly a personal victory. Hell, it wasn’t even personal.

Kaidan took a shower first anyway. Brushed his teeth after a dinner of what had to be boiled Prejek Paddlefish and hanar calamari because it tasted like _wrong_ felt, and used some of that extra-strength mouth-rinse he’d picked up last time they were on the Citadel, and spent a while on his hair, maybe—no, _definitely_ too long.

He spent a while on his face, too, which honestly… He didn’t recognize some days. Most days. Every day, when he wasn’t expecting to see it, and caught sight of it in a reflective surface, like the tinted glass on an elevator door or even the polished chrome plating on the Normandy walls. A few angles reminded him of the kid he’d been, the picture in his very first ID card when he arrived on Jump Zero, but the others were somebody else. Every day, the features he thought of as his were changing.

Shepard, on the other hand…

Shepard was always the same guy no matter when or where you looked at him, no matter what point you took, what angle you were coming from. He had a couple of different faces, fewer than most people, somehow even fewer than Tali, who wore a mask.

Kaidan didn’t know what to make of that. All he knew was that he was trying to make something of it—pretty much all the time. When he closed his eyes. When he stepped into the shower. When he rubbed himself dry again, and tugged on his briefs, and looked at himself in the mirror, and saw his dark eyes and his pinched forehead and his mouth, which tended to read as disapproving no matter what he did with it.

Unless, of course, he smiled.

There was no corona around him, though. Some people had it; some people didn’t. And the problem with that was that the power of their gravity pulled all the smaller, darker bodies in toward the light.

…That was definitely _Fleet and Flotilla_ talking. And Shepard was more of a Blasto guy, which meant stars exploding—not stars winking on and off in the darkness. It meant groan-worthy one-liners, the kinds of puns Kaidan usually kept to himself.

And for good reason, too.

He chuckled. Or coughed. Or cleared his throat to clear his head, which he shook, and when he looked back up, he recognized the guy in the mirror.

Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko, L2 Biotic, Blood Type A neg., spending too much time on his hair—and it showed. He smoothed down the top bump and saw the freckles over his eyebrow were getting darker. You know, from spending too much time in the light.

_Choose your next Blastoventure_ , he told himself, and brought his omni-tool, already loading up the reference guide and the forum discussion about the old downloadable content. There were some mods floating around out there; Kaidan did his research on the long walk about which ones were rated higher than others. Some of them, obviously, were just plain fetish-site stuff, but what wasn’t on the extranet these days?

He wouldn’t lead with that.

_Obviously_.

_Do you: knock? (Click here)_

Kaidan knocked. The door slid open too fast, definitely quickly enough that Kaidan almost found himself knocking on Shepard’s chest instead of on chrome paneling. Sometimes there wasn’t enough of a difference between the two worth mentioning, but right now, in his civvies, as informal as he ever got, Kaidan still felt like Shepard was built out of the same stuff as the Normandy.

And, okay, it was part of the attraction. The man beneath all the hard armor, just as hard to figure out as interlocking joints or an encrypted file download…

‘Hey,’ Kaidan said.

‘Come on in, Kaidan,’ Shepard replied. He stepped aside. Kaidan remembered the games he’d played on hand-helds when he was a kid, navigating big ships through narrow spaces. Part of the fun was in watching the wings graze the tight canyon walls, listening to the sound effects, getting just close enough without crashing and losing the round. Losing the…whatever they were; bragging rights, maybe.

Kaidan’s elbow barely skimmed Shepard’s stomach. Too bad he was wearing an omni-tool; too bad he was still feeling it anyway.

‘You thirsty?’ Shepard asked.

‘Nice place,’ Kaidan replied. ‘Uh, yeah, I could…go for something, whatever you’ve got. Early day tomorrow, though.’

Shepard’s pause might’ve meant more than it sounded like. It might’ve been one more nuance Kaidan hadn’t picked up on, as caught up as he was in the effects of Shepard’s orbit on _him_ as he was these days. ‘…Water, then. That’s…exactly what I was thinking. Nothing like a refreshing glass of water.’

Kaidan wondered if he should chuckle. He cleared his throat.

‘Make yourself comfortable,’ Shepard added, gesturing toward the bed. Only it wasn’t the bed; he was gesturing toward the couch. Which, Kaidan had to admit, actually looked more comfortable than the bed. He didn’t sit down. ‘…Should I say something like _at ease, soldier?_ ’

Kaidan chuckled this time. ‘No, I, uh… Guess this is why fraternization’s off limits, huh, Shepard?’

‘’Cause it’s so damn awkward?’ Shepard asked.

Kaidan rubbed his palms on his thighs and sat down, knees bumping the coffee table in front of him. _Do you: Crash and burn?_ ‘Something… Yeah, something like that. You have the datapad?’

Shepard snatched it off the desk next to what looked like a couple of service awards, no pictures, a simple set-up or a lonely one; there was no way of knowing. Then, Shepard sat down next to him, smelling like fresh soap. That was one thing they had in common.

‘Figured you could always transfer some _Fleet and Flotilla_ , too,’ Shepard said, handing the datapad over. ‘…Not that we have too much time for recreational reading these days—right, Kaidan?’

‘Right,’ Kaidan said.

‘But, a guy I know with some pretty good taste just so happens to like the series…’ The leather of Shepard’s jacket creaked as he leaned closer, one hand on Kaidan’s shoulder to watch Kaidan work. ‘…So why not? Might be good Mass Relay reading.’

‘Or if you’re up for a midnight snack,’ Kaidan said. ‘…Or a past-midnight snack. Biotic, uh—biotic metabolism.’

‘Heard L2s run hot, too,’ Shepard replied. ‘I did some research. I like to get to know my team. But only what Alliance has on file. Nothing personal.’

_Nothing personal_.

‘Yeah, of course.’ Kaidan synched his omni-tool and the datapad and started the transfer. ‘You’re—a great commander, Shepard.’

‘You’re a pretty good lieutenant, Kaidan,’ Shepard said.

As far as romantic dialogue went, even _Fleet and Flotilla_ got it better. That was part of the charm. Kaidan watched the download percentage bar tick forward agonizingly slowly and tried not to compare it—too much—to progress being made elsewhere.

Because, at least, the download bar would fill up eventually. There were no guarantees for anything else.

‘So,’ Shepard added. ‘About that ending…’

‘I’ve got a couple of theories, myself,’ Kaidan replied. ‘I mean, if you wanted to hear them, commander.’

‘Shoot,’ Shepard said.

*

Three hours later, Kaidan only stopped talking because he realized his voice was hoarse—and because he was waiting for Shepard to say _I should go_ , the major turning point in every conversation they’d ever had. That turning point was always an ending.

Except they were in Shepard’s cabin this time; there was nowhere else Shepard _would_ go. It was late and Kaidan swiped at his eyes, water long finished and the download already installed. ‘…Anyway, that’s just…some of what I was trying to work out once I got through the final installment,’ he said, after a long pause that had him worrying Shepard might’ve fallen asleep somewhere shy of an hour back. ‘I think it’s more individual than that, though. Kind of an artistic choice, leaving it open to interpretation that way.’

‘Guess I’m not much of an artistic person, then,’ Shepard said.

His voice was rough, stubbly like the late-night shadow they were both getting. Just a simple shadow, but Kaidan could see it in the sharp hollows of Shepard’s cheeks, along the side of his jaw, under the full swell of his bottom lip. Kaidan could see it and he’d _be_ seeing it for nights to come, however long it took to wash the clean smell of soap of his skin.

He missed the days when he thought oxymoron was an insult.

Kaidan took a quick breath. Shepard leaned forward, brow furrowed like he thought it was a yawn.

‘Don’t tell anybody my big secret, all right?’ he said with a chuckle. A real one, not his throat being cleared before he delivered acting orders. ‘I’m a pretty simple guy, Kaidan.’

_What’s that like?_ Kaidan thought.

‘Simple’s not so bad, Shepard,’ Kaidan replied.

‘And then there’s complicated.’ Shepard’s eyes locked on Kaidan’s and the only thing Kaidan could compare it to was a target scan. _There’s the hot spot_ , Shepard would’ve said. _Take us in, Joker._

_Do you: go for it, for once? (Click here)_

_Avoid fraternization, possible demotion, a permanent mark on your file, and the risk of going against all your better instincts just to know what that soft mouth feels like? (Click here)_

‘I should go,’ Kaidan said. ‘…Probably.’

Shepard chuckled again, deeper. ‘…That was a joke, right?’

‘Can’t be,’ Kaidan told him. ‘My jokes usually aren’t too funny.’

‘Don’t sell yourself short, Kaidan.’ Shepard rubbed the fronts of his jeans, thumbs splayed over denim, big hands with a few old scars crossing the knuckles. If they’d been elcor, this would’ve been a lot easier. A lot less attractive, too, but it took all kinds. ‘We oughta do this again sometime.’

‘Sure,’ Kaidan said. ‘Tell me how you like _Fleet and Flotilla: The Poseidon Effect_ when you’ve gotten around to it. It’s one of my favorites.’

‘Will do,’ Shepard replied.

The rhythm was off. They bumped knees when they stood. Kaidan came too close to crashing but that was because Shepard hadn’t been the one to say he should go. It was like getting caught on the wrong side of a knock-knock joke, realizing you didn’t have the punchline. Kaidan left the datapad on the desk and Shepard followed him to the door.

_Do you: head back to your bunk for the night? (Click here for the end)_

Kaidan shook his head. ‘Thanks for the water,’ he said.

‘My water is your water, Kaidan.’ Shepard looked the way Shepard always did. If he’d been a quarian with a mask it would’ve been a relief; at least that way Kaidan would’ve been expecting nothing more than a warped reflection. ‘...Heh. Doesn’t quite have the ring to it should, does it?’

‘Water’s great,’ Kaidan replied.

Famous last words.

The door slid shut, hissing into place like one piece of armor clicking into the next. Just like that, the walls were up again.

What would Blasto do? Kaidan had read enough of those dumb serials in preparation for knowing what he was talking about if Shepard asked that he actually had the answer to that question. He’d use his brilliant hacking skills to set up a time-bomb in the doorframe, and when the rubble cleared, his tentacles would be…glistening provocatively.

_Thought you could get away from me that easily, huh, commander? Well geth again._

Kaidan didn’t have tentacles. He’d never been one of those kids who wished he did or pretended he did, either. There was something in his head—and it wasn’t an implant—that never let him forget what he did have, and how that informed what he didn’t.

Kaidan knocked. The door slid open too fast and Kaidan’s knuckles landed on Shepard’s chest.

‘Stop right there, Alliance scum,’ Kaidan said.

‘Whoa,’ Shepard replied.

Kaidan fisted his fingers in the front of Shepard’s leather jacket, zipper pressing along the main lifeline on his palm.

‘Glad you don’t have tentacles, Kaidan,’ Shepard said, licking his bottom lip. Kaidan kissed it after and Shepard coughed, or chuckled, or actually groaned, stepping back inside and letting Kaidan go with him. 

‘You know I’m not a Blasto fan, Shepard,’ Kaidan admitted, rubbing Shepard’s stubble with his nose. It felt good; really good. It felt like explosions and supernovas but also the stars twinkling against the dark sky. It smelled like soap and dinner and aftershave that was too strong.

‘I know, Kaidan,’ Shepard replied. ‘Your impression, though… It’s pretty spot on.’

‘Wanna see my tentacles?’ Kaidan asked.

Shepard chuckled. He choked. His lips parted, and Kaidan slid his tongue past them, up against his teeth, swallowing the sound that came next, which was definitely a moan.

It…hadn’t been fourteen years since the last time. A couple of dates, when Kaidan had the time; nothing special and nothing to write home about. Mom asked sometimes, but Alliance life wasn’t exactly about the opportunities to meet people you weren’t prepared to lose in combat the next day.

Shepard let Kaidan push him back against the wall. Kaidan kept waiting for the orders to come until he realized he was calling all the shots.

Considering the hierarchy here, it was…weird to know.  

‘That was a lot of tongue,’ Shepard said. His voice was husky, slurred. It sounded like they’d been drinking, only Kaidan knew they’d only gone for water. ‘Wouldn’t think it just to look at you.’

‘I’ve heard that before, actually,’ Kaidan replied.

Shepard’s eyebrow did a thing—a thing Kaidan didn’t recognize; a thing he realized, half a second later, with primed Alliance reflexes, was an expression. Not unique. Just his own.

‘…Not lately, though,’ Kaidan added.

‘Were you using Blasto to flirt with me?’ Shepard waited for Kaidan to nod, mouth dragging against his lower lip, swollen from the scrape of late-night stubble. ‘…I don’t know how to feel about that.’

‘Because of the whole…superior officer thing,’ Kaidan said.

‘Because of the whole Blasto thing, actually.’ Finally, Shepard dropped his hand to the small of Kaidan’s back. His fingers ran a few casual but almost hesitant circles before the very tips settled over the curve of Kaidan’s ass, right at the top, as if to say, _This okay, soldier?_

‘Look, Shepard…’ Kaidan sounded like he’d been drinking, too, all deep and snaring. ‘I like you, and it’s… I get it, all right? You’re my CO. You’re the commander of this ship. I’m not gonna let something distract me from a mission, either.’

‘Go back to the tentacle part,’ Shepard said. His palm was inching lower. ‘I liked that better. Hey, did that sound weird? Just so you know, Kaidan, I’m not into tentacles. Turians, though… I’ve always had a thing for turians.’

‘Okay,’ Kaidan said. ‘Should I do the Blasto stuff again, or are we pretty much…’

‘Probably better if we don’t.’

‘Yeah.’ Kaidan’s breath got caught on the stubble under Shepard’s bottom lip. ‘Yeah, that’s a relief.’

He kissed Shepard again after that. This time, he took it nice and slow. 

**END**


End file.
